


pick up your hoop skirts get out your guns cause this wild wild west is about to get won

by agentx13



Category: Marvel (Comics)
Genre: 1872, Alternate Universe - Western, F/M, sharon carter month
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:01:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28264326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agentx13/pseuds/agentx13
Summary: Sharon Carter is sent on a covert mission to the town of Timely to find evidence to prosecute Wilson Fisk and his cohorts. She quickly realizes that she's been set up to die. But the local sheriff is determined that she not die on his watch.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Natasha Romanov, Sharon Carter/Steve Rogers
Comments: 1
Kudos: 13
Collections: Sharon Carter Month





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Shout-out to Joshlyn, who wanted an 1872 fic with Sharon! ... maybe 1872 canon with Sharon. ... Hmm...
> 
> Oh! And just a note for anyone who hasn't done so yet, we're voting on prompts for next year's Sharon Carter Month [here](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1goHBjj2uGHsi5JVNTwyxcFecFHwsTkSPIbtbZKe7eQ0/edit). So if there's something you want to see (or something you don't), you have the power to move things up and down in the rankings! The poll closes New Years Eve!

Sharon Carter stepped off the train in Timely and noted to herself that at least the air was too dry for her hair to frizz despite its heat. Not that it mattered with the veil covering her features. Still, if she’d had her druthers, she’d be back home in Virginia rooting out the remains of the Confederacy. She knew how to root out Confederates. Hell, she had the hoop skirts and exaggerated flounces that the echelons of civilized southern society called for. The Wild West? She didn’t know what the Wild West called for, not really. All she knew was what little she’d read and what she could currently see with her eyes.

Timely, Sharon had learned with all the benefits of her worldly education, was dirty.

She walked down the wooden platform, her fashionable boots too loud despite her best efforts, and made her way to the porter to look over her trunks as he tossed them carelessly off the train. Unlike New York, Washington, or even Richmond, she didn’t have to skirt around anyone. Timely’s platform was completely empty. She looked over her shoulder. “Is it always so busy?”

“Um,” the porter said, not getting the joke.

Sharon held out a single paper bill. The man instinctively reached out to take it, but her grasp on it remained tight. “When can I expect someone to help me with my luggage?”

“Um,” he repeated.

Sharon waited, but no more information was forthcoming. She sighed and loosened her grip on the bill. The man grabbed it quickly enough. Perhaps he’d had more practice grabbing tips than he had answering questions. He was also surprisingly spry as he clambered onto the train again. A gesture, and the train began to chug away again.

Sharon looked after it as it worked its way into the distance. So. Here she was in Timely with nothing but a vague investigation and luggage she may have to carry herself.

“How long have you been widowed?”

“’Bout a month now,” Sharon answered, turning. She paused when she took in the appearance of her new companion, the red hair in a loose braid underneath the cowboy hat, her dress understated and not hooped. “And I am overdressed.”

“You’ll dress down soon enough, I’m sure,” Natasha drawled. She put her fingers to her lips and let loose a piercing whistle. Sharon caught movement in the ticket booth down the way that looked suspiciously like someone waking up and falling off their stool. The man popped out of the small room, and Natasha said, “We’ll need a station porter, Pete. Her ladyship’s coming to my place.”

“I should stay in a hotel,” Sharon demurred.

“Only hotel here charges by the hour,” Natasha replied. “How bad did you mean it when you said you were overdressed?”

Sharon, instead of answering such an uncouth question, gave into the heat and sun and opened her black lace parasol.

Natasha stared at her.

“Shouldn’t have done that after saying I’m overdressed,” Sharon agreed.

Natasha quirked a grin as Pete joined them. “I’ve got a cart. Her ladyship doesn’t travel light.”

“But she tips well,” Sharon added.

Pete struggled with her luggage more nobly after that.

She and Natasha kept their conversation light and boringly civil as they waited. Her trip had been fine, New York was quite different than Timely appeared to be, but Sharon was desperate for a change in scenery. California ought to be just the thing when she was done catching up with old friends. She was quite desperate for a new beginning. Natasha truly was too kind to put her up. Yes, Natasha agreed, she was.

It wasn’t until they were alone, settled on rickety wooden chairs in Natasha’s kitchen, living room, bedroom, and – Sharon hoped – not also the outhouse, that they both dropped the ruse.

“Fisk deserves to hang, not be brought to trial.”

“His type aren’t often brought to trial,” Sharon agreed sedately. Assassins always had been more interested in killing than justice, and Natasha had been one of the best. “But evidence and an understanding of the situation certainly help. I’ve also been tasked with bringing down Roxxon.”

Natasha watched her. With the door closed and the curtains drawn, the place was shockingly dim. “If the Secret Service wanted Fisk and Roxxon taken down, they wouldn’t have sent one agent.”

“Maybe they think the agent has friends.”

Natasha shot her a bland expression. “You have friends?”

“I tip well.”

Natasha’s lips quirked. Sharon saw a faded picture of her former husband over Natasha’s shoulder. Sharon may be pretending to be a widow, but Natasha had been hardened by the genuine experience.

“I’m going by my name,” she said calmly. “Sharon Carter. My husband, Neal, succumbed to illness last month. Consumption. He was my beloved, I was with him til the end, it was terrible, et cetera, et cetera.”

“Et cetera,” Natasha agreed with a nod.

“Darling Neal left me wealthy, but I couldn’t bear to remain home any longer. Everywhere I went, everything reminded me of him, and thinking of him makes me too melancholy. I’m desperate for a change of scenery. California must be wonderful, with its different trees and oceans, don’t you think?” Even to her own ears, she sounded annoyingly saccharine. She’d practiced the story until she could act it out in her sleep, even though playing the part made her want to punch herself in the face.

Natasha sighed.

“I just wish my grief wouldn’t lay me so low with the headache so often.” Sharon took a sip of some of the most tepid tea she’d ever come across. “Your turn.”

Natasha sized her up in silence for several seconds before relenting. “Fisk kills anybody who steps out of line. My husband, James, got himself killed. The sheriff, Rogers, says he was scalped to make it look like the Indians did it.”

Sharon caught the tone in Natasha’s voice. It wasn’t that Natasha didn’t believe this Sheriff Rogers, Sharon mused, it was that Natasha didn’t trust him. Or perhaps merely his suspicions. The Natasha of five years ago had always suspected everyone. Grief and loss would only serve to make that worse.

“Rogers tries to give everybody hope. Man’d try to move a mountain on his own if he thought the mountain were in the wrong place.” She paused, her features falling. “But Fisk uses torture. Rape. Murder. Goes after people’s loved ones. And nobody can be protected all the time. And nobody,” she said, glaring sharply at Sharon, “will arrest Fisk.”

Sharon took another sip of her tea. “Fisks’ associates? Roxxon, especially. How do they communicate?”

“Telegram. Encoded. They change it every so often. I haven’t been able to muddy those.”

“Mm.”

“He’s got the judge in his pocket. When Ben Urich, the reporter, tried to print something that made Fisk look bad, his wife, Doris, was tortured and raped. Still scarred up. Lost the use of an eye. Some people just go missing, maybe with some blood or a body part left behind. That’s the thing about Fisk,” Natasha said slowly. “He doesn’t just hurt people. He wants people to know he hurt them. And that he can hurt the people they love. That’s the worst part. You never know who’ll get punished if you step out of line.”

Sharon set her cup in her saucer with a gentle clink. That might explain why Natasha hadn’t yet acted on her own. Or maybe she had, and James had paid the price. She didn’t think it was safe to ask. “Would you give me a tour of the town? Introduce me to some of these folks?”

Natasha shoved herself to her feet. “Ain’t much to show, ain’t much to tell. Let me put it this way – this town’s got a two-story casino and no church.”

“No wonder you stay.”

Natasha shrugged, her eyes briefly straying toward the photograph behind her. “Yeah,” she said.

* * *

As the newest person in town, and its shiniest, most foreign new toy, Sharon had no difficulty meeting nearly everyone. From the forward-thinking Carol (Sharon approved) to Fisk’s right-hand man Mr. Barrett (Sharon disapproved), everyone was eager to get as much information from her and give her as much as possible. Sharon handled it with ease; she’d been raised in drawing rooms and polite social parties, and she’d long ago mastered the art of talking much while saying little, and hearing more than she was meant to. It was one of the reasons why Chief Wood, a former friend of her father’s, had asked her to help the Secret Service on off-the-books work. She only caught a glimpse of the man Natasha indicated was the sheriff before a towering figure in white strode down the street, people hastily clearing away from him in a manner that told Sharon whom he was before she had time to wonder about his identity at all.

“Madam,” Fisk said with a flourish, no doubt having realized that Sharon’s dress cost more than the town he lived in. The entree her wealth afforded her was precisely why Sharon had chosen to advertise it. He offered her a hand, and she set hers politely in his and bobbed a curtsy. She wasn’t supposed to know who this was, after all. Add to that the disguise of a somewhat vapid young widow, and people would buy the act with ease. Somehow, people were happy to believe women vapid. Even other women, sadly enough.

“Sir,” she murmured softly.

“I am Wilson Fisk. The Mayor of Timely. I was passing by and noticed a new face. If I may be of service…”

“Of course, Mayor Fisk. Charmed to meet you. I am Sharon Carter. Just passing through to visit a friend on the way to California.”

“A shame your stay will be so brief. I hope you’ll find it in your heart to stay longer.”

Pssh. She could read that message well enough. He wanted time to rob her. The downside of advertising wealth. “Perhaps I shall. Mrs. Barnes is such a good friend.”

“Mrs. Barnes,” Fisk repeated. There was a hint of a pause; Sharon wondered if he were thinking of a misdeed toward Natasha, or to her husband. She may not be as suspicious as Natasha, but she trusted the man as much as Natasha did. “She is one of our very best citizens.”

“One of the best people I’ve ever met,” Sharon said fervently. Fisk’s eyes were steady on her in a way that suggested he wanted to look at Natasha, and she suspected she knew what he was wondering. “She was such a dear friend of my husband’s,” she said, her tone utterly innocent.

“Ah,” Fisk said, catching the faint implication that Natasha had been her husband’s mistress and the heavier implication that Sharon had been too dumb to realize what was going on.

“And after our marriage, of course, she became a dear friend to me, as well.”

“Ah,” Fisk repeated, now having to wonder if Natasha had been Sharon’s mistress as well, or if Sharon were simply too dumb for words.

Sharon smiled her dumbest smile, giving nothing away.

“Well. If you should need anything, dear lady.” He bowed again; she curtsied again, and he went on his way. She noted the men who followed in his wake.

She also noted that everyone else had wandered off to a safe distance, though the sheriff was much closer.

“Ms Carter, is it?”

“Mrs,” she replied. She held up her hand, her wedding ring worn over the lace glove.

“Right,” he said, sounding almost embarrassed for not noticing the widows’ garb. “Sheriff Rogers.”

“Char-”

“You should be wary, ma’am. Not everybody in these parts is respectful of ladies and their belongings.”

Interrupting cad. “Oh, I don’t know,” she said blithely. “They seemed quiet nice.”

Whatever reaction Natasha had to that was held in place by years of training; only a spasm of her shoulders and a belated huff of air suggested a snort.

The sheriff’s eyes bored into Sharon’s veil. “Where are you staying, ma’am?”

“With Natasha, of course. Though I should say, I’m only telling you because you’re law enforcement. I’m not in the habit of telling strange men where I sleep.”

“I’m not in the habit of letting young widows get molested on my watch.” He looked to Natasha. “I’ll do what I can, but try and get her out of here.”

“Right,” Natasha said.

Overreaching cad, Sharon thought. And talking _over_ her? _Really?_

Natasha looped her arm through Sharon’s with a firm tenacity that sent Sharon’s hoop skirt swaying. Thank her stars and garters for her stays, or else the whole street would have seen what her imaginary husband had. “Let’s go home, dear.”

“And you’ll teach me the ways of the flesh?” Sharon murmured in an undertone, her eyes large and almost childlike.

“I’ll teach you about sadism if you keep it up.” Natasha gave her a tug.

Sharon looked over her shoulder. “Very nice to meet you, sher-”

He was already gone.

Rude, boorish cad.

* * *

Armed with memorized maps, Sharon let herself into Fisk’s office through a window on the second story. She was, happily, unrecognizable from the person she was earlier. She could still remember how awful she’d felt in trousers at first, but every time she had to put on multiple layers for a dress, she gained a deeper appreciation for breeches. Now, with her long hair braided and pinned beneath a cap, sensible, soft-heeled boots, knives and guns tucked away into sensible trousers and a dark man’s shirt heavy enough to flatten her breasts, Sharon felt like a different person.

As she rifled through Fisk’s desk, she had to note that she enjoyed the person she was at the present moment. A spy. A woman with a job. An unofficial one, perhaps, but an important one nonetheless.

An unofficial spy who was finding a veritable treasure trove of evidence against him _and_ Roxxon. Fisk really had no fear of being sussed out, did he? He was wholly confident that no matter what he did, he would get away with it.

Which meant, she reasoned as she made sure there was no sign of her having been there, that he was keeping an eye on any information getting out of town. The reporter’s wife had paid for his story, after all. And he’d be sure to have the telegraph operator on his payroll. She could send a message to New York, but it would have to be in code.

But Natasha also wasn’t wrong when she’d said that if the Secret Service really wanted this done, they wouldn’t have sent one lone spy. Did they expect her to manage? Did they expect her to return a glowing report of Fisk’s innocence?

No, Sharon realized, ice water in her veins. They expected her to die. There was no other reason to send her here alone, with no other resources than her wits and a couple traveling trunks. She doubted Chief Wood had set her up, but there were others who were upset at the notion of a woman working alongside them who would think nothing of betraying their morality if it meant not having to compete with a woman. That was why Fisk had sought her out earlier. It wasn’t just the bit about a fresh face. He was sizing up the enemy. Her compatriots had warned him she was coming, and he would oblige them by getting rid of their competition.

Ugh. Men disgusted her sometimes.

Speaking of men disgusting her.

Sharon stopped short and studied the shadow in the alley. She had only met him briefly, but she knew that silhouette, that hat, the glint of torchlight off the badge. She sniffed and continued on her way, walking as a man would.

“Quite a transformation,” he drawled after her.

Drawling, insipid cad.

And then he was beside her, hands in his pockets. “Saw you leaving Natasha’s tonight. Out the back window. Real unladylike. Got curious.”

“Don’t know who you think you’re talking to, mister,” she said, her voice low, “but I’m afraid you got the wrong fella.”

“Right,” he said, and there was a hint of a smile even in his voice.

She knew how to punch people. He probably didn’t know that.

“You obviously ain’t a friend of Fisk’s.”

Ugh. _Fine._ “You obviously need to stay out of matters that don’t concern you, Sheriff.”

“I hear that a lot. Thanks for dropping the charade.”

“I’m terrible at charades,” Sharon admitted, lying.

“Right.”

Her fists started to itch, begging her to punch the irritating sod. 

“Who you working with?”

“What makes you think I’m working with anybody?” she demanded, wheeling on him so she could get a better look at his face in the darkness.

“Because I might have to arrest you for breaking and entering otherwise.”

“You wouldn’t,” she told him. “Because then Fisk would find out.”

His features sobered, unlike Stark singing on the other side of the house. “I wouldn’t let him hurt someone in custody.”

“You couldn’t stop him.”

She’d thought his features had sobered before. Now they were utterly teetotaler.

“If it helps,” she told him, “he’ll likely try to kill me in a little while anyway.”

“What?” his eyes were sharp on her face.

She shrugged. “It’s the logical play. Now. If you’ll excuse me.” She walked toward Natasha’s once more, only to find herself stopped by his hand. A very large, firm hand.

“Now, listen here, ma’am,” he said in a tone she’d heard before, the one that said, “You listen to me while I ignore anything and everything you say.”

What happened next was quick and sure. She should, she supposed, have warned him to let her go, but the feel of his nose against her fist was so very gratifying. Her knuckles ached with pleasure at having been put to such use.

“’Listen here, ma’am,’” she mimicked as she stalked back toward Natasha’s.

Insufferable cad.

* * *

The next day found her back in her widow’s weeds, talking to people throughout the town and visiting with Natasha out and about. It didn’t escape her notice that the sheriff was always in the distance, and it warmed her heart to see that he sported dark bruises under his eyes. She must remember to tell him how well they suited him.

Not that she didn’t appreciate his quiet protection, she supposed. She was a little on edge, too, and as surly as Natasha was these days, she was also surreptitiously checking the windows and alleyways wherever they went.

“He knows you won’t be able to escape,” Natasha had said over breakfast. “No messages out. He can dangle you for weeks.”

“I,” Sharon said stubbornly, thinking of the sheriff just as much as she thought of what’s-his-face. “will not be _dangled._ ” Fisk. Right. But she couldn’t argue Natasha’s point. “We’ll have to dangle him right back.”

“And how do you propose to do that?” Natasha queried, a little too politely.

Sharon glared at her. “If you thought I had an idea, you wouldn’t ask using that tone.”

Natasha grinned. “I hope you think of something quick. For my part? I vote for killing them all.”

“You and your bloodlust,” Sharon complained without venom.

Natasha’s eyes failed to make it all the way to James’s picture.

“It’s on the table,” Sharon admitted.

They were invited to lunch with Fisk, who pronounced himself eager to discuss affairs from other parts of the country.

“I’m honored,” Sharon had said in her soft, dumb, widowed debutante voice.

He’d kissed her knuckles.

Honestly, if she hadn’t had the threat of death hanging over her head, the lunch would have been the most boring affair of her trip so far. Thank her stars and garters, she’d thought at one point, for the threat of murder. She wasn’t sure she’d make it through the monotony of Washington affairs and New York tourism and the Reconstruction in Virginia without knowing she wouldn’t have to do it much longer.

Unfortunately, she’d survived it. The bastard had probably delayed killing her just so she’d have to suffer his company, devil take him.

“It is odd,” she said over a quiet dinner with Natasha that evening, “that no one seems to work at the mines.”

Natasha frowned at her. “Of course they do. Mostly Fisk’s men.”

Sharon frowned more deeply. Not that it was a competition. “That’s even more suspicious.”

“What do they have in the mines?” Natasha agreed.

Sharon considered the different possible scenarios. Ideally, she’d have faith in a system that would hold Fisk and Roxxon accountable. Unfortunately, she wasn’t certain she could get her own coworkers fired for setting her up to die. All she truly knew was how difficult it would be to do anything if she got killed.

“I’m checking the mines,” she said. “Care to join?”

“Might as well. Don’t want you to leave me with the dishes again.”

“Did I do that?” Sharon asked, far too innocently.

* * *

She wasn’t entirely surprised to find the sheriff waiting for them by the back door. He did, however, seem surprised to see Natasha in trousers.

“Whatever you two are planning, I hope you remember you’re ladies.”

Sharon and Natasha looked at one another.

“Yeah,” the sheriff said. “I didn’t think that would work. But I’m not letting you do this foolishness alone.”

They looked at each other again and shrugged. He’d be easy enough to lose if they had to.

Without another word – though the sheriff tried – Natasha led the way. It took nearly an hour to sneak across the railroad tracks, wade through the river to avoid the guards at the dam, and sneak along the opposite bank until they reached the mines.

Sharon surveyed the scene, crouching down.

“We’ll have to go in,” the cad said, unnecessarily.

Sharon and Natasha stared at him.

“Ladies?”

Sharon felt her fist start to itch again and pressed a finger to her lips.

Natasha led the way again. After a communicative glance at Sharon, she stepped into the shadows whenever a miner or other person was present, and Sharon followed suit. She noted that the sheriff, large and luggish as he was, wasn’t terrible at sneaking around. That was fortunate for him. If there was a chance any of them were going to get caught, she was pushing him into the gunfire and making a run for it.

They found nothing but mines and miners, but Sharon and Natasha were both determined to keep looking. They became more irascible toward dawn, but they were no less determined.

“We should just kill him,” Natasha murmured.

“You waited until I couldn’t think without sleep to say that.”

Natasha shrugged, then drew up short. Sharon nearly bumped into her. The sheriff certainly _did_ bump into her. In the darkness, she couldn’t blame him, but the memory of him against her rear made her blame him anyway.

Natasha turned. “Why would Fisk assign someone to guard a door here?”

“Let’s ask,” suggested Sharon.

Natasha drew a knife from her sleeve.

The sheriff started making noises. Since they didn’t sound like noises of warning, Sharon held up a hand to silence him. “Leave enough to question.”

“Like I’m an amateur,” Natasha groused.

Barely five minutes passed before the door was open with the guard slobbering on the floor.

The dim candlelight inside revealed people caked in dirt, their clothes rank and filled with holes, all manacled to the wall.

“Na- Natalia?”

“ _James?_ ” Natasha’s voice came out in a whisper. She disappeared into the dimness, and Sharon vaguely recognized the man from his photograph of Natasha’s wall.

Well, Sharon thought. So much for leaving the people here until a rescue could be arranged. Either she had to get all these people out, or she’d have to leave Natasha behind. And she couldn’t leave Natasha behind. She turned to the sheriff.

“I saw a wagon we can use,” he said. “Two horses ought to do it. We can leave them at Ms. Morse’s outside of town.”

Sharon remembered Natasha’s maps and shook her head. “Too close. They’ll search there.”

“Mrs. Parker is too sick to have so many people there.”

“Ms. Danvers?”

He considered. “There are too many for her.”

“I’m sure she’ll be able to recommend some friends not in Fisk’s employ. Help Natasha get them out. I’ll grease the wheels and get the wagon ready.” She left before he could argue. She _knew_ he was going to argue, too. Her fist could feel it.

* * *

He carried most of them out and set them in the wagon with a gentleness belied by his size. Sharon had managed to find blankets; some of them were bundled around the horses’ hooves to muffle their noise. It was a near thing, but they made it away from the mines.

When she was sure it was safe to speak, Sharon said, “He doesn’t look scalped.”

“I was so sure,” Natasha whispered.

“Me, too,” the sheriff said grimly. “He disappeared. A scalp and blood were left behind. It made sense.”

“I wonder whose scalp it was.”

“Unfortunately,” the sheriff said, “there are too many possibilities.”

Sharon guided the wagon to Ms. Danvers’ house. By now, the sky was lightening. He got out to knock on the door, and within minutes, several other neighbors had been rallied and were quietly helping people off the cart. There were hushed cries and greetings, and Sharon sat on her driver’s seat and wondered what Fisk had to gain from leaving them alive.

“Sheriff,” someone said, far too loudly, and everyone went deathly still.

“On’y me,” Stark slurred. “Ulrich is lookin’ for you. Lynchin.’ An Indian. Up.” He wagged a hand. “You know.”

“I know,” the sheriff said grimly.

“Want a lift?” Sharon offered.

He shook his head. “I’ve got a horse.”

Sharon looked toward the casino. “Whatever you do, sheriff-”

“I know. Do it fast. He’s about to find out his prisoners escaped, and all hell’s gonna break loose.”

Interrupting cad.

“I’ll take a ride,” Stark suggested. He leaned into the wagon and tried to kick himself the rest of the way on. Someone ended up pushing him the rest of the way.

The sheriff was already gone, his horse’s hooves pounding into the distance.

It was probably for the best, Sharon thought.

“Where we goin’?” Stark asked. “My place?”

She sent him a look of disgust. “No. We’re going to stop Fisk before he kills us all.”

Stark paused. “I need a drink before we do that.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sheriff Rogers is shot and about to be fed to the pigs. Sharon is determined not to let him die on her watch.

Within half an hour, all the pieces were askew. Fisk was outside somewhere, dealing with the lynching or the sheriff or both. James was at rest in his wife’s bed. After Dr. Banner had examined him, the doctor and Natasha had gone to help the sheriff. Stark was in his offices. The former prisoners were in hiding.

And Sharon was in Fisk’s office, waiting.

The person who entered, however, was not Fisk, but a Native with white paint on his face. The two of them looked at one another.

“You aren’t Fisk,” they said at the same time.

Sharon leaned back in Fisk’s seat. “Are you looking to kill him?”

The man nodded.

“He’s looking to kill me,” Sharon explained. “I aim to beat him to it.”

He considered her.

“Where’s the sheriff?” she asked. “Aren’t you the person he was sent to help? If I don’t miss my guess.”

“He’s fighting Fisk’s men. I came for Fisk. But there’s no Fisk here, and no Fisk’s men.”

Sharon frowned. “Impeccable logic. Do you know where the sheriff is?”

The man pointed down the street, and Sharon immediately went to the window. Sure enough, the fool was in a shootout, pinned down by some people who looked like professional killers. This, Sharon groused, wouldn’t do.

She studied the man for a breath and handed him one of her pistols. “Go help him. Don’t come back here.”

“Why? You think to take care of Fisk on your own?”

Why did all these men think women were incapable? Sure, it was useful when she was fooling them, but when she needed them to listen, she needed them to _listen._

“There won’t be a here.” She went back to the desk and pulled out the dynamite she’d hidden there when she’d heard him come in. One day, perhaps, people would search her luggage before she got on a train. But they hadn’t this time.

His eyes widened on the dynamite, and then he was gone.

She nodded her approval and lit the fuse. As much as she wanted to walk away at a sedate pace, she gave in to her inclination to run, the traveling bag she’d packed before she’d left Natasha’s banging against her legs.

She ran straight into Fisk’s casino.

“They’re killing him!” she screamed in a panic. “Oh, God, they’re killing him!”

The men inside froze over their cards and drinks.

Sharon remembered she was wearing the wrong outfit to play the dumb debutante.

Fisk’s office exploded.

That got them to their feet and out the door. Sharon didn’t question it. More fuses lit. More dynamite tucked away. Only on the first floor. Fisk’s office had been a message. His precious casino coming down entirely was merely a bonus.

And then she ran out the back, toward the shootout where the Native and the sheriff were.

“Let the pigs have him,” Fisk was saying. He lifted the sheriff up. There was blood. The sheriff was groaning. Still alive. Maybe not for long.

He was a cad, but he didn’t deserve that.

Sharon took out her spare pistol. A bullet caught her in the arm, making her grunt, but she fought to keep her focus the sheriff. What she wouldn’t give for a rocket.

Instead, she shot Fisk in the ass and dove to the side as Fisk yelled.

And dropped the sheriff on top of him.

Sharon looked in her bag. She should have brought more weapons, she thought grimly.

Fisk’s casino exploded.

The assassin’s ran past her toward the casino as Fisk screamed.

One did not.

And then his head exploded.

Looking down the alley, she saw the Native and gave him a little wave.

He disappeared, headed toward Fisk.

She took a breath. She didn’t have much ammo. She’d expected to call a cavalry, not to be the cavalry. But what she had, she stuffed on her person as quickly as she could.

She stepped out of the shadows. “Wilson!”

“You _bitch._ ”

“I’d like the names of the people who told you I’d be here.”

“I will _kill_ you.”

The sheriff moaned, his fingers spasming.

“Wilson Fisk, you are under arrest by order of the United States Secret Ser-” She gasped as she caught one of the townspeople gesturing to her and barely moved in time to avoid a bullet.

“Like that?” a man with mess of brown hair beneath his bowler hat demanded. “There’s more where that-” He grunted as Sharon’s bullet hit his heart.

But behind him were more.

The man with a bullseye on his head fell back, and the Native threw himself into a fight with the woman, who defended herself with a sword. It truly was, Sharon thought wryly, the Wild West.

Fisk advanced on her, and Sharon steadied her gun. Where was she? Right. “Service.”

And then something hulking and gargantuan and metal blocked her. “Help the sheriff,” said a voice that sounded suspiciously like Stark’s.

Sharon gulped. The suit was almost medieval, but there was something about it that was entirely modern, even futuristic, and deadly.

But she didn’t have time to consider it. She nodded and ran down the alley, doubling back to come around the pig sty. Fisk had his back to her. She could shoot him, she thought.

The sheriff took a ragged breath. 

She could kill Fisk or she could help the sheriff.

She dropped to her knees beside the sheriff and rolled him over. He didn’t have the breath to groan, but his breath hitched. She used her knife to open his shirt.

Cads didn’t have the right to look like that without shirts, she thought dimly. She cut his shirt to shreds and pressed it to the wound.

“It missed your heart,” she told him. “Assuming you have one.”

He stared at her. “’Course I do,” he gasped.

“Good,” she said cheerfully. “Then it missed being shot. The point of being in a shoot-out, by the way, is to _not_ get shot.”

“Make a note.”

She needed a doctor, she thought desperately. His blood was already soaking through the cloth and through her fingers. She couldn’t move him, not like this. She needed medical supplies. She’d barely been a teenager during the war, but she’d had her share of working in makeshift hospitals.

Most people who got shot died.

A gunshot pierced the air, and his eyes fluttered open. When had his hand ended up on hers?

“Is he alive?” Natasha asked.

“Barely.”

“What do you need?”

Sharon grit her teeth. “A doctor.”

“He can’t help from heaven or hell. What else?”

Damn it. The town only had one doctor. She might actually be his best chance. She rattled off a list of ingredients, and Natasha left, replaced by Stark in his stained underwear. She didn’t want to know what the stains were.

“Infection is the biggest risk,” she snapped at him. “Can you rig something to keep the wind from blowing dirt at us?”

He stared at the sheriff, looking shell-shocked, then nodded.

The Native returned. The sheriff’s breathing was labored. “How local are you?” Sharon demanded.

“Very,” he remarked dryly.

“Get me what you can to help with this. I don’t know the herbs in this area.” It didn’t occur to her until he was gone that she didn’t actually know if Indians used herbs for medicinal purposes. She didn’t know if they had old wives tales or hospitals.

Stark returned first and got to work, roping in townspeople to help.

Natasha returned with Danvers in tow, and Sharon, trying her best to keep her hands steady, got to work.

* * *

Sharon left Natasha’s home. Even though he was still recovering, Natasha and James clearly had need of privacy, and Sharon, after seeing and hearing too much, had need to give it to them.

It was quieter in the sheriff’s quarters, on a makeshift cot in the sheriff’s room. Of course, he wasn’t sheriff anymore. Unable to fulfill his duties in his condition, he’d invited Red Wolf, the Native who’d first tried to destroy the dam, to take over for him. Red Wolf, surprising even himself, had accepted, but had insisted the sheriff – Mr. Rogers, she meant – stay in the sheriff’s lodgings until he was well enough to travel again.

With Sharon’s limited skill, she doubted he would be strong enough to walk around normally for four months. She had to admit to some degree of panic when she caught him trying to get out of bed after only one month had passed.

“You like telling people what to do, don’t you,” he griped as she made him go back to bed.

“Immensely,” she said in her coldest, most intimidating voice.

He was stubborn as hell. So was she.

It wasn’t until he threatened to escape out the window that she let him out on closely-supervised walks, alert for the slightest hitch in breath, the faintest stumble. She made him put his arm in a sling, just to be safe.

“This isn’t necessary,” he insisted.

“You have more faith in my medical skills than I do.”

“And look how right I’ve been so far.”

Her eyes narrowed. She no longer wanted to punch him. But there were times where her palms itched. “Hmph.”

“So you’re with the Secret Service?”

“Unofficially. Their chief is a former friend of my father’s.”

“Former?”

“Father was a Confederate. I gave information.”

“On your own father?”

She shrugged. “It was no moral sacrifice on my part.” She misread his frown. “Do you want to sit? I can get some lemonade.”

He sat, but his lips were almost in a smile. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you like me.”

“You’re known for your self-righteousness, Sheriff. Not your intelligence.”

He looked at her, and she tapped her foot impatiently. How was it, she wondered, that she had less understanding of his expressions now than when they’d first met? Even more impatient and frustrated, she tapped her foot louder.

“Are you still unofficially with the Secret Service?”

“We’ll have to see. I’m not sure my report of traitors in the organization will be a brilliant recommendation.”

“I’d recommend you,” he said.

“Of course you would,” she said with an inelegant, derisive snort.

“So you’re not a widow.”

“Neal Tapper was the first boy who ever asked me to dance. I’ve pretended to be married to a variation of him several times.” She bit her lip. “I hope he never finds out. That would be awkward.”

He laughed, then grimaced.

“Maybe you should go lie down.”

“Didn’t you say something about lemonade?”

After that, it became something of a regular outing, walking with him up and down the street and chatting with the locals. After the third month, she allowed him to not wear the sling.

She didn’t like the way he smiled at her at the news. It made other parts of her than her fist or her palm feel warm.

* * *

Murdoch sued Fisk’s estate on behalf of the town and Fisk’s prisoners, whom he’d been using as slave labor in the mines. The prisoners got ownership of the mine, and they gave Steve a share in it. Soon, the town of Timely was rich and growing, nearly a city.

It wasn’t lost on Sharon that Steve offered her his arm when they walked now. She told herself it was because of the chill in the air that she accepted.

“What will you do after this?” he asked.

“After I’m certain you’re recovered, you mean?” she countered, trying not to think of how he’d clearly recovered.

“Yes,” he said. “That.”

“I’d like to go back to New York,” she said, a hint of longing slipping into her voice.

He glanced at her.

“I want to punch those traitors in their traitorous faces.”

He threw his head back and laughed. “Do you plan to go alone?”

“Natasha can’t come. She’ll bring James, and they’re not what anyone would call quiet.”

“No,” he mused. “They’re not that.”

“They’d get me kicked out of the city.”

“Don’t despair. They might lock you in a church in an attempt to save your soul.”

“They’d fail miserably. I have no soul.”

“As I have no heart,” he said, and there was something to the way his eyes glittered.

“I thought you said you had one.”

He shrugged. There was no grimace of pain. Of course, he hadn’t shown any such grimaces in some time.

Why, she wondered, was she still sleeping on a cot beside his bed? He didn’t need her.

“Maybe we should make a deal,” he suggested.

“What do you have in mind?”

“You be my heart, I’ll be your soul.” His tone was light, but his shoulders were tense.

“Why, Mr. Rogers, are you courting me?”

“I think I’m asking you to marry me, actually,” he admitted. “I suspect we passed ‘courting’ the second month you slept by my side.”

“When you say it like that, it _does_ sound bad,” she admitted. Had she become a fallen woman by accident? And without getting the fun that Natasha and Bucky got, to boot. “I don’t know,” she said slowly, ignoring his look of panic. “I don’t often get courted. I think I’d like to be courted.”

“Then I’ll court you.” His voice was firm. “In New York. Timely. California. Richmond.”

“Maybe start small,” she suggested. “On the train.”

He was still facing her, but he seemed closer, warmer. “My bed is smaller than a train.”

It was her turn to throw her head back and laugh. Bold. Very bold.

Steve grumbled.

“My cot is smaller than your bed,” she countered.

“A kiss is smaller than your cot.”

She tilted her head, pressing her lips together. His eyes were on hers, save more a momentary glance to her lips, following by pressing his own together before looking at her again. “Yes,” she said decisively. “That seems small enough to start with.”

He leaned forward, but she stopped him with a gloved hand.

“As a widow,” she reminded him, “perhaps we should do this someplace where it will cause less scandal.”

He blinked at her and took a step back.

“JUST DO IT ALREADY!” Stark shouted from across the street.

Startled, Sharon and Steve looked up. Stark stared back in open challenge, while other townspeople quickly looked anywhere else.

“My place,” Steve said, ushering Sharon back home. “Where it’s _private._ ”

“With friends like these,” Sharon intoned.

Alone at last, they made sure the door was as locked as it could be, and then they stared at each other for several seconds.

“So,” Sharon said.

And then his lips were against her, his hands in her hair, and she was melting into him for reasons other than the chill in the air.

They started small. They didn’t stay that way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Less than two days left to vote for next year's [Sharon Carter Month prompts!](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1goHBjj2uGHsi5JVNTwyxcFecFHwsTkSPIbtbZKe7eQ0/edit) Vote while you can! (And if you _have_ voted, thank you!)


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